Forgiveness
by Author Unknown1
Summary: Fear and a demon with a prayer.


Disclaimer: The copyright laws always prevail and I make no money off of the likeness of the characters that I use in the making of this fan fiction. I also make no money nor earn no fame from the likeness of the situation that I use in this fan fiction that is similar to that of the movie who made a good deal of money using the likeness of a pre-existing universe along with characters and all. But I hold no grudge. Nope, no grudge at all.   
  
Author's note: Criticize the hell out of this please.  
  
***  
  
I Forgive You  
  
*  
  
The abandoned cathedral looked ominous in the dark ink of the night. The boards creaked in the tower, some having rotted so much that they hung limply and splintered kept up by sheer will. The churched looked unstable, as if it could topple with the smallest of breaths. But it did not; it, instead, held strong against the strongest of winds.   
  
The frame of the church creaked as if it were moaning in the absence of its child. Once brightly colored, now faded, circus posters flapped in slight breezes that always came in the top of the building amidst the support beams and the spider webs.   
  
It was a dark but familiar place in the rafters as the wind whined in irritation for their settler who had long been without his prayers for several days now. But, though seeming abandoned in the first, this was an untruth. Within the belly of the church was a heartbeat, small and barely audible with the moaning wood and whining wind. She sat upon a pew, knees pulled upon chest staring at the candles that remained unlit in the darkness of the cathedral. Her long unruly hair hung over fearful eyes that wavered a bit at the breezes coming from holes in the walls of G-d's House.   
  
The wind wailed with irritation, yet the girl did not waver in her fetal position. It was a position that she had adapted long ago that kept her safe and unseen even in the smallest alleyways. Her bare toes curled around the seat of the pew in slight discomfort from the wind. She shivered ever so slightly her eyes locked on the darkened candles. She wondered silently if she had enough courage to light one. The dilapidated church groaned in her indecision.   
  
An odd, strangely loud, noise suddenly came from the back of the church. It was like the sound a bullet, but with no target to find. It was almost like something had imploded but with an odd smell that was hard to place that wafted up towards the front of the church and into the child's nostrils. The first sound was followed by a second sound, a sickening thump on the old wood of the church. The worried rafters above creaked in acknowledgement of their long absent resident coming home. The figure looked up at the rafters in sympathy, his odd amber-yellow eyes showing an extreme pain to them and an unforgivable guilt. He had traveled a long way and exhaustion sat in the lines around his eyes and mouth. A watery film lie reclining on top of his lower lids locked in a prison of determination.   
  
He attempted to stand, grabbing a pew for support, his three-fingered hand grasped the wood as if it were a lifeline but his knees did not cooperate with his desires and they created another thump on the rotting wood of the cathedral. Dust from the impact caught moonlight and made a mist that looked oddly like a heavenly halo around his demon-esque figure.  
  
"Ach" came his sorrowed curse. The pain was too much. He could go no further neither with body nor mind so he sat, looking up at the rows of pews and the candles sitting unlit in the shadows of sacred silence. The dam that held back his sorrow faltered for a bit before letting one of his precious tears roll down his blue-scarred face. His breath became ragid and the dam became weaker as his odd hand clutched a small rosary at his side.   
  
She looked around slowly; peaking over the top of the pew at the figure slumped in exhaustion. He was not drunk for she had seen her fair share of drunkards enter these cathedrals looking for redemption in a moment of inebriated sorrow. He was not high for his body didn't convulse and his eyes didn't wander, though she couldn't really see his eyes. Though his hands seemed to shake, they did not do so with uncontrolled might but with something else, like strain. All was fine when he was in the shadow; he was not a threat to her. But as his head looked up towards her direction seeing only the candles, her eyes widened in a new kind of fear.   
  
She was good at hiding. She had hidden her entire life. But never before had she wanted to flee as much as this moment. In her awe her head peeked above the pew making her visible. The creature was breathing abnormally quickly but she could not see past the yellow eyes, blue skin and white shards of teeth to see the sorrow that was harbored in the creature's actions. She only knew fear. She gasped. And she gasped again at her own gasp, covering her hand over her mouth.  
  
His rasping stopped and his eyes faltered from the darkened candles to a forehead peaking from the front of the church above the back of a pew. He was not alone. For not the first time he attempted to stand feeling dizziness and weariness clutch him. He could not teleport again; it had taken all of his energy to make it here. Sorrow filled his being as he stared, helpless to freeing her eyes from seeing his form.   
  
"I'm sorry," he whimpered as tears fell softly from his ducts, the imaginary dam smashed into a million pieces. He leaned a tired head against the pew feeling the hotness of his own tears as they fell to their ultimate death from the height of his chin to the wooden floor below. "I'm sorry," he whispered again to the young girl who had peaked even further above the pew.   
  
Her thin face drew taught in shock. Her eyebrows created valleys in the pallor of her skin. Eyes looked large in contrast to her shallow cheeks. Her cracked lips parted in the obvious distress that existed in her entire body structure, a structure that was so thin that it mimicked that of the abandoned church yet who had already survived the strongest of winds and more.   
  
She breathed quickly in fear and confusion. Her knees clutched so tightly to her being that her hips hurt, but it was of no matter. He spoke with such sadness, but her fear at the moment overruled this. Her brows knitted in confusion as she rocked her body rhythmically to non-existent song.   
  
The pew suddenly creaked as the girl ascended, planning on running, but she stopped as she stood rows of pews framing her escape. His eyes had followed her since their connection, dripping with tears but his body no longer racked with sobs. He seemed even too tired for that. She did not know what to do. What good where her instincts for hiding if she had already been seen? What good where her instincts to run if her feet felt like steel, like magnets attached to the floor.   
  
The cathedral breathed as wind traveled through its frame, it was a lung holding within it two hearts. It was a mother that held, in her womb, the fearful meeting of two beings brought together in their search for redemption. It not only held a statue of a solemn Virgin Mary but also was the holy life-giver herself. The broken stained glass was only a visage to the true power held in the very particles that held this building together even in the most horrid of conditions. It held a sympathic energy that attracted those with particles who had also been strained beyond conception and kept a hold even through the most trying of circumstances.   
  
How odd it is that buildings become alive only long after their demise.   
  
The two stared at each other neither one able to move. The silent girl came a fraction of a step closer but still did not flee, though she had a clear path. Her eyes never saw three fingered hands nor speared tail but stayed, like a moth to a flame, at his eyes.   
  
His eyes faltered for a moment from hers. They instead, glimpsed at the unlit candles, unsaid prayers. He longed for enough energy to light one of those prayers even if it meant frightening his already frightened visitor. The young girl followed his eyes to the candles. They both stared at them in odd unity for a moment before the boards started creaking with the girl's shifting weight. She swayed as she walked much like the cloths that hung around them blowing in the wind. Her bare feet did not scuff the floor but walked with practiced silence.   
  
She looked curiously at matches that lie beside the army of candles. She looked back at the demon who sat leaned against a pew. His eyes followed her curiously. Her hands that should have been shaking instead were still with calm precision as she lit a match it momentarily bringing an orange glow to her shallow face. She looked back again as if looking for a confirmation of her acts.   
  
His eyes still stared at her movements in fascination and for a moment sorrow was gone. His lines relaxed and his eyes grew wide. He clutched the cross of his rosary with an odd anticipation.   
  
Ever so slowly she lit a candle, its flame flickering for a moment, and held the match up to the growing winds. The wind obliged her desire and left only smoke, streaming up towards the heavens in place of the match's former light. The figure behind her sighed, she never heard a sigh released with such force. With a new hastiness she turned around making sure the being had not moved to obstruct her way out. When she had seen that he had not, fear came back to her with all of her doubts.   
  
"Zhank you," he said softly, his tongue stumbling over the English "th" sound.  
  
She ran quickly down the aisle and past the being with incredible speed and grand plans of barreling out the door to never think on this incident again. She stopped short of the double doors.   
  
He had closed his eyes in exhaustion but was now aware that she was not yet gone from the church entirely. He could hear her feet shift just at the doors edge.   
  
"I forgive you," came a small voice of one who had not yet been scared enough to flee.   
  
His eyes flew open in wide surprise and they focused on the one-lit candle as he heard her bust through the doors, fear finally winning out. How could she have known? How could a complete stranger, scared of his very existence have known of his secret prayer? Forgiveness was all that he had asked for and forgiveness was what he had gotten. Perhaps it was simply a response to his initial apology but for him it held much more power than simply that. It gave him faith, a faith he had thought he had lost.   
  
"I forgive you," she had said. "I forgive you." And he wept again, but this time with happiness his sharp teeth barred in a grimaced smile.   
  
It was only after this that his destiny began. After he had gained enough strength to bar the doors of the cathedral against any other visitors and teleport to the highest of rafters. Exactly an hour after the thin figure fled from the double doors of the mother-cathedral the doors flew open once more with a new kind of power. The walls of the cathedral shook, but did not fall. Again the building's endurance was tested as powerful harsh winds were summoned and it shook with its own fear for a moment as one of its children was cast down towards the pews. But he did not fall to his death. "Wagner, Kurt Wagner" survived as he always had and went on to fight beside the greatest mutants, the greatest PEOPLE that the world would ever know.  
  
What of the small girl who had played such an important part in this scene? What will her destiny bring her? That is another story, a story that is unlikely to cross with the demon that she forgave in the broken cathedral in Boston. That is a story for books yet written and stories yet told. 


End file.
